the pentagon taking action, it is postponing deployment of two warship toss the persian gulf. that will leave just one aircraft carrier, the uss john c. stennis,ing in the entire middle east region. this begs the question what are we risking by doing this? chris armor is senior naval analyst with the institute for the study of war. chris, welcome back to the show. what -- how dangerous is this? what does this mean to you? >> melissa, thanks for having me. it's a pleasure to be here. yes, it's a big deal. when people hear about it, they simply say, okay, the cut from two carriers to one doesn't seem like a big deal million you understand the broad -- until you understand the broader context in the middle east. over the past three years, we've seen a steep decline in the american ground forces across the middle east. we've withdrawn, essentially, all of our troops from iraq, we're on the way from withdrawing from afghanistan, so really what we're talking about is the navy is there to check against iranian ambition. with two carrier strike groups in the area, we've got a very rob